Recap from Anaheim and Harrogate

Chillin’ in Both Formats

What’s up 60 Cards readers? We just had an exciting weekend in North America and in Europe with the conclusion of Anaheim and Harrogate Regionals respectively. Since both events were in different formats, Expanded and Standard, we decided to cover both events on this week’s Metagame Analysis! Remember, this article is totally FREE for your reading pleasure in hopes that you can enjoy a taste of our premium content and maybe splurge on a PREMIUM membership.

We have done a great deal of improvements on the site lately to make a subscription more worthwhile so maybe try it out with the FREE TRIAL that we have available until the end of the month. Anyways, we are getting slightly off track, let’s jump into this article to cover the events from this past weekend!

The Decks

As stated above, all of these decks were featured in the Top Eight of Anaheim Regionals and are a great place to start exploring the Expanded metagame.

If you are new to the game or if you are looking to improve your game for Dallas Regionals in January, give all of those decks a look into as we go into more detail about them below.

ZoroToad

Pendarvis won the recent Anaheim Regional Championships with his Portland Regionals winning deck,
Zoroark GX (SLG; 53)
/
Seismitoad EX (FRF; 20)
. The strategy of this deck is to draw through your deck with
Zoroark GX (SLG; 53)
by using Trade, locking your opponent with
Seismitoad EX (FRF; 20)
by using Quaking Punch, and using disruption Supporters. Once you run out of cards in your deck, you can use
Tirtouga (PLB; 27)
to loop through your deck to avoid decking out, use
Lusamine (CIN; 96)
to get back important Supporters, and proceed to disrupt your opponent. The deck is obviously a compelling concept by having a high amount of success so lets peep this list out.

Energy (6)

One of the new cards that Pendarvis included in his deck was
Faba (LT; 173)
, a card released in Lost Thunder, that continues to push the boundaries of what a ‘control’ deck can do!
Faba (LT; 173)
is more of a definitive card than
Enhanced Hammer (GRI; 124)
or
Team Flare Grunt (GEN; 73)
because once a card hits the Lost Zone, it is gone. Like GONE! Poof!!! You can NEVER use that card again! It isn’t just Special Energy either, it can take away a pesky stadium or even an annoying Pokémon Tool. I would expect
Faba (LT; 173)
to see more play in future Expanded events so keep your eyes peeled!

VespiFlare

Connor Finton busted out his amazing
Vespiquen (ANO; 10)
/
Flareon (PF; 12)
deck that seemed to surprise the competition as he marched all the way to the finals. The strategy of
Vespiquen (ANO; 10)
/
Flareon (PF; 12)
is to acquire many Pokémon in your Discard Pile to use either Bee Revenge or Vengeance for an OHKO. You can get Pokémon in your Discard Pile by using
Unown (ANO; 30)
’s Ability,
Zebstrika (LT; 82)
’s Ability,
Battle Compressor (PHF; 92)
, and other common cards like
Ultra Ball (SLG; 68)
. Using all of these cards in combination can increase your damage at lightning speeds and allow your single Prize Card attackers to Knock Out double Prize Card attackers. You need to be careful with the amount of resources your Discard though, because you can often find yourself with limited cards in your deck so make sure that you realize that you can deck out or run out of cards like
Double Colorless Energy (SLG; 69)
. As long as you keep your plays fresh and your mind clear, this deck should lead you to success.

Energy (4)

One of the coolest cards that we enjoyed in Finton’s list was the inclusion of
Parallel City (BKT; 145)
. This card actually works in multiple layers so get ready for a few interesting ways to play this card. It should be known that if you limit your opponent’s Bench, then you will subsequently be reducing the damage of your
Vespiquen (ANO; 10)
and
Flareon (PF; 12)
due to their typing. If you limit your Bench, you can actually discard more Pokémon to improve the damage cap of Bee Revenge and Vengeance to potentially get a Knock Out. With Pendarvis winning with
Zoroark GX (SLG; 53)
/
Seismitoad EX (FRF; 20)
, you can always limit how much damage their
Seismitoad EX (FRF; 20)
does too. Lastly, you can bump other opposing stadiums, like
Silent Lab (PRC; 140)
, because
Parallel City (BKT; 145)
is still a Stadium Card. We truly enjoyed the inclusion of this card and we expect it to be a staple in future iterations of the deck.

RayHoOh

Preston Ellis popped off in Anaheim by making Top Four with a unique
Rayquaza GX (CLS; 109)
/
Ho-Oh EX (DR; 22)
deck that seemed to sweep the competition. The strategy of this deck is to use
Rayquaza GX (CLS; 109)
to accelerate Energy into play by using its Ability, continue to nab more Energy with
Max Elixir (BKP; 102)
, and get ever more energy with
Ho-Oh EX (DR; 22)
’s Ability. If you like big powerful decks, this deck is definitely the right pick for you, and it is likely going to see play in Dallas too! There isn’t too much else to this deck, it just seems to pop off and Knock Out Pokémon with plenty of HP. If you don’t believe us on the simplicity of this deck, check out the list yourself, it features many copies of the same cards to make sure that the strategy always works out!

Energy (14)

Our favourite card in the deck,
Zeraora GX (LT; 201)
, is a magical inclusion in this deck for multiple reasons! Firstly, it gives all of your Pokémon in play a chance for free Retreat because you can spread your Energy wherever you want, similar to
Darkrai EX (DE; 63)
in Darkness-type decks. Additionally, it can use it’s GX attack to attach five Energy out of nowhere in a pinch. With all of these strategies working together, I am sure Ellis used them throughout many of his rounds in Anaheim.

Lookin’ at Harrogate (Standard)

While Pendarvis was dominating in Anaheim, we had Philip Schulz dominating in Harrogate with a brand NEW deck,
Zoroark GX (SLG; 53)
/
Gyarados (BUS; 33)
. From what Tord Reklev apparently brought up as a joke, World Champion Robin Schulz’ brother took as a real deck. Regardless of the origin of the deck, Schulz was able to successful win Harrogate Regionals and force many players to at least try out this new concoction. In other news,
Blacephalon GX (LT; 52)
/
Naganadel (LT; 108)
was able to dominate another tournament, losing to a deck that featured Water-type Pokémon in the finals, by coming second overall at the event.

I am sure you all know how much our own writer, Zach Lesage, loves to talk about that deck, so it should be no surprise that he was happy to find out about it seeing success. He has gone on the record to state that it is the best deck in format and it is hard to argue against him when the deck continuously pushes the limits of the game. Most of the other decks were not as interesting, such as
Malamar (FLI; 51)
, so we will cover those at a later date!

The Decks

We assume that those two decks will see huge spikes in play at upcoming Standard League Cups because they both made finals at the recent Harrogate Regionals in the Masters division. Instead of blabbing on about the format, let’s look at the decks that actually saw success!

BlaceNag

60 Cards own Zach Lesage was able to tear up the competition in São Paulo and Roanoke with
Blacephalon GX (LT; 52)
/
Naganadel (LT; 108)
so we already covered some of the ground with this deck. As stated before, this deck is all about consistency, taking quick Prize Cards, and overwhelming your opponent as soon as possible. The goal is to quickly use Burst GX, get
Naganadel (LT; 108)
set up, and start using Mind Blown with
Blacephalon GX (LT; 52)
! If your opponent is able to draw two or three Prize Cards, you can use
Beast Ring (FLI; 102)
to quickly attach
Fire Energy (GEN; 76)
to your Ultra Beast Pokémon to have more Mind Blown fodder available. This deck has solid match ups across the board, is easy to play, so we think its going to be a solid choice for upcoming League Cups and League Challenges.

Until Next Time

Well, that concludes this week’s Metagame Analysis! I hope that you have enjoyed this journey and that you look forward to next weeks FREE article.

Next week, we will be looking over the Expanded metagame heading into Anaheim for your viewing pleasure. It is our hopes that with the content becoming better each week, that you will decide to support our site with a subscription.